5 Great Books You May Have Missed in February

Jasmine Darznik, Song of a Captive Bird
(Ballantine Books)

She had me at “The Sylvia Plath of Tehran.” Jasmine Darznik’s fiction debut, Song of a Captive Bird, tells the story of Forugh Farrahkzad, an artist and contemporary of Plath’s who defied her traditional upbringing to forge a path for her poetry and her feminism in 20th-century Iran. “Because I was a woman, they wanted to silence the screams on my lips and stifle the breath in my lungs. But I couldn’t stay quiet . . .” Important caveat: This is a historical novel, not entirely factual; any reader looking for a stick-to-the-truth account of Farrahkzad’s life should go elsewhere. Darznik, whose memoir The Good Daughter detailed her own struggle against her conservative Iranian patriarchy, uses Farrahkzad’s story as a frame for considerations about womanhood and creativity.

Minrose Gwin, Promise: A Novel
(William Morrow)

Promise: A Novel by Minrose Gwin examines what might have happened during a devastating historical disaster: The Palm Sunday Tornado of 1936 in Mississippi that killed at least one-third of the population of Tupelo, a small cotton-mill town. It’s still listed as the fourth most-deadly tornado in US history, and it might be even worse, except that many of the casualties were unlisted: African-Americans who were not on the “official” town rolls. Gwin shows Dovey, an African-American laundress, gathering her family—husband, grandchild, and great-grand—and finding temporary shelter with a devastated white teenager, Jo. Gwin writes plainly but compassionately about how humans move through and onward after devastating loss, especially the kind that Dovey has known her entire life. This novel deserves a wide readership.

Brandon Hobson, Where The Dead Sit Talking
(Soho Press)

If you’re looking for new Native American voices in fiction you’ll find Brandon Hobson’s novel Where The Dead Sit Talking intriguing (Elissa Washuta has many more suggestions, here). From Soho Press, the book is set in late 1980s Oklahoma and follows two Native teenagers, Sequoyah and Rosemary, as they negotiate paths separately and perhaps together through foster care. Hobson, who won a 2016 Pushcart, is a member of the Cherokee Nation Tribe of Oklahoma, and has written here a dark and arresting tale: Sequoyah cannot cope with the secrets he keeps, but even worse, Hobson shows, with the dreams he dreams. “Something inside me ached, like being held underwater and straining for breath,” Sequoyah says. It seems no one wants to know what’s inside these young people, and that leads to the tragedy we know has happened from the very first page.

J.M.G. Le Clézio, Bitna: Under the Sky of Seoul
(Seoul Select)

Bitna: Under the Sky of Seoul will not surprise any close followers of French author and 2008 Nobel laureate J.M.G. Le Clézio’s work; he’s been so interested in Korea for so long that he has learned Korean, and has written here a kind of Scheherezade of Seoul. When 19-year-old Bitna, just arrived from the provinces to attend university, gets a job telling a woman named Salome stories, she finds her voice through those around her: a pigeon-keeper, a young woman afraid of a stalker, a famed singer in free fall, and others. Le Clézio weaves these characters into each other’s lives and takes the reader on a physical journey from manmade landmark to natural destinations. “The most impressive thing about Seoul is that because it has so many people and a variety of elements, it’s always transforming. When you come back to a certain place six months later, some things have disappeared and new things have constantly been created,” says the author.

Ross McMeekin, The Hummingbirds: A Novel
(Skyhorse Publishing)

The Hummingbirds: A Novel by Ross McMeekin is the book I’d recommend for anyone with a soft spot for a well written psychological thriller. Necessary Fiction calls it “existential contemporary noir with West Coast gothic vibes,” and that’s accurate. Groundskeeper Ezra falls into a weird relationship with his celebrity clients, a would-be star and her producer husband. There’s the Middle East, a cult, adultery surveillance, loads of money, more glitz—and Los Angeles itself, with its lush scenery and greenery.